FARMINGTON, UTAH — A two-day jury trial for a convicted sex offender has been canceled following a a guilty plea. Gary Ellis Hamblin, 48, of Layton, entered a guilty plea to one count of attempted sodomy on a child, a first-degree felony. A sentencing hearing is scheduled for Oct. 6 in 2nd District Court in Layton before Judge Robert Dale.

An eight-year-old boy was covered in pepper spray, forced to eat his own vomit, gagged and locked in a cabinet to silence his cries for help just days before his mother and her boyfriend allegedly beat him to death, according to court records published on Monday reports the Los Angeles Times. Gabriel Fernandez’s mother, Pearl, 30, and her boyfriend, Isauro Aguirre, 34, abused ‘every inch’ of their child before his gruesome murder in May, 2013, a Los Angeles’ court was told by prosecutors. Prosecutors claim that ‘for eight straight months, Gabriel was abused, beaten and tortured more severely than many prisoners of war,’ – even writing his own suicide note – and convened the grand jury after repeated delays in setting up a preliminary hearing for Fernandez and Aguirre who are charged with murder.

Baby had injuries from head to foot A 10-month-old baby had injuries from his head to his feet, including burns covering his body which would have caused extreme pain, before he was rushed lifeless into a remote WA roadhouse, a Supreme Court murder trial has been told this morning. Opening the State case against Mervyn Kenneth […]

York County, Virginia – A 31-year-old woman was arrested and charged with child neglect and murder on Thursday in York County. Deputies from the York-Poquoson Sheriff’s Office were called to a residence in the 80 block of Challenger Circle on Tuesday along with Emergency Medical personnel after receiving reports of an unresponsive toddler. The 16-month-old girl was pronounced dead at the scene. Preliminary autopsy results indicate the child died from strangulation.

MOULTRIE — A man who is thought to have fathered up to eight children with his daughter pleaded guilty this week to two counts of incest. Ruben Fernando-Lopez, 42, is scheduled for sentencing on Sept. 30. He could receive a minimum of 20 years or up to 60 years in prison, as each count carries a 10- to 30-year sentence. Law enforcement began investigating Fernando-Lopez after his daughter gave birth in Albany to a premature child who was born on June 12. The baby died a few days later.

Johannesburg – Western Cape police were on Tuesday investigating the alleged rape of a 5-year-old girl by three Grade 2 boys at a school in Rocklands, Mitchell’s Plain. The 5-year-old Grade R pupil was allegedly raped on 4 March in the grounds of a primary school in the area, said police spokesperson Frederick van Wyk.

A Colorado woman appeared in court on Monday for the first time after being charged with abusing her 7-year-old daughter who suffered from seizures and was unable to walk or speak when found living amid squalor, prosecutors said. Leah Dyer, 47, of Fort Collins is charged with one count of felony child abuse resulting in serious bodily injury, said Linda Jensen, spokeswoman for the Larimer County District Attorney’s Office. Her husband, Douglas Dyer, 44, faces the same charge. Both are free on $10,000 bonds.

COTTONWOOD HEIGHTS — A man was charged with second-degree felony child abuse after police say he hit his 5-year-old daughter. Michael Shaun Hall, 27, allegedly beat his daughter after she fed the family dog with food from the dinner table, according to Sgt. Corbett Ford of the Cottonwood Heights Police Department. The 5-year-old didn’t like what she was eating and when Hall stepped away from the table, she fed her food to the dog, Ford said. “Instead of disciplining, he takes it further and uses a belt and apparently a hanger, which caused substantial bruising and injury to her,” Ford said.

Washington – A child molester who was raped while held in the Garfield County Jail in Pomeroy is suing the county. The complaint filed Tuesday in Walla Walla Superior Court says the man suffers anxiety and nightmares. He’s seeking an amount of money that would be determined at a trial in the civil rights lawsuit. The Union-Bulletin reports the man was jailed in August 2011 for investigation of child rape when he was raped three times by cellmate John Markwell.

The Brooklyn father who fatally beat 7-year-old Nixzmary Brown also forced his son to rape a relative, according to reports. The new allegations were laid out on Wednesday against Cesar Rodriguez, who was convicted in the 2006 torture and killing of Nixzmary, in a case that shocked New York and forced a major shake up of the city’s child protection agency. Rodriguez’s now 15-year-old stepson, who has been charged with raping two relatives some eight years ago, told detectives that his stepfather forced him to commit at least one of the crimes, the New York Daily News reported. The father made the boy commit the act while he watched, sources told the New York Post. The alleged rape would have happened before his sister’s murder in 2006, when he was about 8 years old.

An 18-year-old man has been charged with viciously assaulting an autistic boy at a Florida house party after sickening video of the attack went viral.
Andrew Wheeler allegedly kicked, punched and held a knife to the throat of the intoxicated 16-year-old boy before choking him until he lost consciousness on August 8. Disturbing footage shared on Facebook shows the boy cowering and screaming in pain as party-goers stood around and laughed.

A 34-year-old Brooklyn woman who is six months pregnant was laid out cold in a vicious “knockout game” attack. The violent assault was caught on video. The victim, Jannatul Ferdous, was walking with her sister in Brooklyn’s Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood Thursday when 33-year-old Willie Stephens slugged the pregnant woman with one single blow, knocking her unconscious.

The two Amish sisters from northern New York who were kidnapped this week and then found safe a day later were sexually assaulted, the St. Lawrence County’s District Attorneys office told NBC News. Investigators believe suspects Stephen M. Howells II, 39, and Nicole F. Vaisey, 25 had planned the kidnapping using “coercion tactics” and knew ahead of time they wanted to take the girls, St. Lawrence County Sheriff Kevin Wells told reporters Saturday. Howells and Vaisey are being held without bail on first-degree kidnapping charges in the abduction and could face 25 years to life in prison if convicted. Wells added that “there was the definite potential” for additional victims, and the suspects could be hit with more charges.

A man convicted of inflicting sadistic ‘torture sessions’ on his girlfriend’s three-year-old son before fleeing with her to a Florida theme park, has been jailed for 67 years. Roland Dow, 28, from Plaistow, New Hampshire, was sentenced yesterday for burning, blinding and treating James Nicholson, who is now lame, ‘like a caged animal’. He was convicted in June of assaulting the toddler, failing to get him medical help, coaching him to lie to a social worker and secretly recording the social worker’s visit. The young boy is the son of Dow’s girlfriend, Jessica Linscott, who pleaded guilty to child endangerment and witness tampering. She will be serving between two and seven years in prison.